She Who Became The Sun is one of those books that come surrounded by an aura of strange, ill-fitting expectations: advertised as “Mulan meets the Song of Achilles”, greatly hyped by the same content creators that generally promote YA fantasy novels, it is actually a not really that romantic, not even so magical retelling of the rise to power of the first Ming Emperor. Even though I was aware that the blurb was somehow misleading, I still approached it expecting something lighter and cacthier than the novel was actually ever meant to be.